goatee-script.js

     _______  _______  _______  _______  _______  _______
    |    ___||       ||       ||_     _||    ___||    ___|
    |   | __ |   _   ||   _   |  |   |  |   |___ |   |___
    |   ||  ||  |_|  ||  |_|  |  |   |  |    ___||    ___|
    |   |_| ||       ||   _   |  |   |  |   |___ |   |___
    |_______||_______||__| |__|  |___|  |_______||_______|
                                     . ,
                                     (\\
                                  .--, \\__
                                   `-.     *`-.__
                                     |          ')
                                    / \__.-'-, ~;
                                   /     |   { /
                    ._..,-.-"``~"-'      ;    (
                 .;'                    ;'    ´
            ~;,./                      ;'
               ';                     ;'
                ';                 /;'|
                 |    .;._.,;';\   |  |
                 \   /  /       \  |\ |
                  \ || |         | )| )
                  | || |         | || |
            ~~~~~ | \| \  ~~~~~~ | \| \  ~~~~~~~
            "''"' `##`##' "'"''" `##`##' '"''"'"
            '"'"''"'"''"''"''"'"'''"'"'''"''"'"'
            ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
       _______  _______  ______    ___  _______  _______
      |  _____||     __||    _ |  |   ||    _  ||_     _|
      | |_____ |    |   |   |_||_ |   ||   |_| |  |   |
      |_____  ||    |   |    __  ||   ||    ___|  |   |
       _____| ||    |__ |   |  | ||   ||   |      |   |
      |_______||_______||___|  |_||___||___|      |___|

A goatee is the perfect complement for handlebar mustaches. :-{>~

Objective

GoateeScript provides an unique language that is implemented in, modelled after and compiled to “ordinary” javascript. Sounds complicated ? It isn’t ! Look at the following example:

Javascript:

(function() { var test = 1 + 2 * 3 ; return test })();

Coffeescript:

do -> test = 1 + 2 * 3

Goateescript:

test = 1 + 2 * 3

All three examples are equivalent and return the number 7.

As goatee.js provides attributes to map data into markup, I decided the best way to go would be a language that is compact, readable and (the most important feature) has a scope consisting of a chain of contexts. Still confused ? Believe me, the haze will be lifted, once the framework has reached a state where it is useable. For the time beeing there is a command-line interpreter to prove my concept.

See:

• goatee-rules.js.
• goatee.js.

Javascript – the source and destination

The rule of thumb is: a goateescript is a single javascript expression without any declarations or a collection of expressions suiteable to fit into a single line. The last expression’s value is always returned to the invoking context.

Similarities to javascript

• The language is a subset of javascript, without any differences in syntax but with less grammar. You could take a goatee-script and run it as javascript … but usally you will get a completly different result

Differences to javascript

• Variable assigments are always local to the given script
• Scripts have one or multiple contexts for each execution
• Scripts are either directly interpreted at runtime, compiled to interpretable bytecode (usefull for runtimes implemented in other languages than javascript), or pre-compiled to javascript, which is the fastest and production way to go
• Function declarations are forbidden
  • Hence not implemented
  • Of course you can use functions, provided by the script’s context
  • You could provide methods to declare them, which would be somewhat arkward, but possible
• Regular-Expression declarations are forbidden
  • Hence not implemented
  • Of course you can use regular expressions, provided by the script’s context
  • You could provide methods to declare them, which would be somewhat arkward, but possible
• Most javascript statements are forbidden
  • With the exception of “if”/“else” statements all the others (“for”, “return” “switch”, “yield” and so on) are not implemented. This might change in future but for the time beeing all of them are not neccessary in the context of the goatee-framework.
  • Of course you can use use all of them in functions, provided by the context
  • You could provide methods to declare them, which would be somewhat arkward, but possible

Installation

$ npm install -g goatee-script.js

Usage

$ goatee-script -h

Usage: goatee-script [statements]... [options]

statements     string passed from the command line to evaluate

Options:
   -r STATEMENT, --run STATEMENT   string passed from the command line to
                                   evaluate
   -h, --help                      display this help message
   -i, --interactive               run an interactive `goatee-script` read-
                                   execute-print-loop (repl)
   -m MODE, --mode MODE            [c]ompile, [e]valuate, [p]rint, [r]ender
                                   or [s]tringify statements, default:  [eval]
   -c, --compress                  compress the abstract syntax tree (ast)
   --nodejs OPTION                 pass one option directly to the 'node'
                                   binary, repeat for muliple options
   -v, --version                   display the version number and exit

If called without options, `goatee-script` will run interactive.

Documentation

Read the annotated sources.

Development

Install dependencies …

• node.js (≥ 6.x)

  … for production version:

   $ npm install goatee-script.js --save-prod
  

  … for development version:

  $ git clone https://github.com/sjorek/goatee-script.js
  $ cd goatee-script.js
  $ npm install
  

Run build …

$ npm run build && npm run test && npm run doc

(not tested yet)

Credits go to …

• … Zachary Carter and all contributors of jison parser generator

• … Jeremy Ashkenas and all contributors of Coffee-Script as a source of inspiration